Over 1,000 homes damaged in Germany during flooding

More than 1,000 people were missing and more houses were damaged in flood-hit areas of West Germany and Belgium on Friday, where water levels were still rising and the death toll was already at about 117.

Entire communities lie in ruins after swollen rivers swept through towns and villages in the West German states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, Belgium as well as the Netherlands.

“It was so horrible that we could not help anyone. People were blowing at the windows,” Frank Thel, a resident of Schuld, told Reuters in front of a pile of rubble in the city of Rhineland-Palatinate, where several buildings were collapsing. dumped.

In Germany only, 103 people have perished in the country’s worst loss of life in years. Twelve of the deceased were residents of a home for the disabled in Sinzig south of Cologne who were stunned by the flash floods during the midnight.

Moreover, the death toll is expected to rise as more homes collapse, with media in Belgium stating at least 14 people have died.

Some 114,000 households in Germany were without electricity and mobile phone networks failed in some flooded areas, meaning family and friends could not locate their loved ones. read more

“Our state is undergoing a flood disaster of historical proportions,” said North Rhine-Westphalia Prime Minister Armin Laschet, referring to major damage in 23 towns and rural districts.

In Rhineland-Palatinate, about 1,300 people were reported missing in the Ahrweiler district south of Cologne, the district government said on Facebook.

FOLDED INFRASTRUCTURE

Further north, in Erftstadt near Cologne, several houses collapsed on Friday morning, and authorities feared.

Residents have been evacuated, but some have returned home so officials do not know who may be in the homes, said District Commissioner Frank Rock, adding, “We expect deaths.”

Roads around Erftstadt were impassable as they were washed away by the floods. Rescue teams tried to reach residents by boat and had to rely on walkie-talkies to convey information.

“The network has completely collapsed. The infrastructure has collapsed. Hospitals cannot accommodate anyone. Nursing homes had to be evacuated,” a Cologne regional government spokesman said.

A district spokesman said 55 people had been rescued and 15 were still trapped in their homes there.

One dam near the Belgian border, the Rurtalsperre, flooded, while another, the Steinbachtalsperre, was stabilized early Friday. Some 4,500 people were evacuated downstream from the communities, and a section of the A61 motorway was closed amid fears of a breach.

The German army has deployed more than 700 soldiers to help with rescue efforts.

REINFORCEMENT OF DIKES

Thousands of residents in the northern part of the Limburg province in the neighboring Netherlands were ordered to leave their homes early Friday while the floodwaters reached a peak.

Emergency services were very ready, and authorities also reinforced dikes along vulnerable sections where floodwaters continue to rise.

Water flowed in the southern city of Maastricht, where no floods occurred, in the city of Valkenburg, where damage was widespread but no one was injured.

At least four people are missing in Belgium. The Belgian crisis center has urged people in large parts of the south and east of the country not to travel.

France has sent 40 troops and a helicopter to Liege in Belgium to help with the flood, Prime Minister Jean Castex said on Twitter. [nL8N2OS1OI

“The waters are rising more and more. It is narrow,” said Thierry Bourgeois, 52, in the Belgian city of Liège. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

In the city of Maaseik, on the Dutch border, the Meuse rose past a retaining wall and littered with bags on top.

Several towns and villages were already under water, including Pepinster near Liege, where about ten houses partially or completely collapsed.

The death toll in Germany is the highest of any natural disaster since a deadly North Sea flood in 1962 that killed about 340 people. In the crash of a high-speed ICE train in 1998, 101 people were killed.

Floods on the Elbe River in 2002, then described by the media as “one-off floods”, killed 21 people in East Germany and more than 100 in the broad Central European region.

Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, said the extent and intensity of the floods was a clear indication of climate change and showed the urgent need to act.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer told Spiegel magazine that the federal government’s goal is to provide financial support to the regions concerned as soon as possible, and to add a package of measures to the cabinet on Wednesday. go for approval.